


five times the fam realized that klaus ain’t dumb

by ObliqueOptimism



Series: five times fics (mostly about klaus if we're being honest about ourselves, which we are) [2]
Category: The Umbrella Academy (TV)
Genre: 5 Times, Gen, Implied/Referenced Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Implied/Referenced Drug Use, Not Beta Read, Smart Klaus Hargreeves, Sober Klaus Hargreeves
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-27
Updated: 2019-11-14
Packaged: 2021-01-04 06:35:43
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 3,886
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21193202
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ObliqueOptimism/pseuds/ObliqueOptimism
Summary: Five times that the Hargreeves siblings realize Klaus is smarter than he appears to be.





	1. sleepy-time math

**Author's Note:**

> it has come to my attention smart klaus is a rarity and we must fix that

Klaus wasn’t sure why he was in the kitchen at such an ungodly hour. He’d only had two hours of sleep, he should still have been in bed. Instead he was barely sitting in a chair, mostly draped over the table, head on arms, eyes closed. His siblings having a conversation around him that he wasn’t really paying attention to, the one ghost in the corner, as per usual, was gargling at him. All background noise.

It was Sunday and that meant the family breakfast. Luther was surprised that Klaus had shown, considering how he seemed to be two seconds away from snoring. He’d heard him tell Ben (Luther assumed) that he had two hours of sleep. He then heard Klaus mumbling something about the noise. Which Luther could have sworn it was a quiet and peaceful night. Shrugging, he grabbed a pencil and started on the crossword puzzle in the Sunday paper. 

Most of them were pretty easy, who wrote this, finish the common saying, what is the latin word for strawberries. Luther kept half his attention on the rest of his siblings as he did the puzzle. He heard Diego and Five start bickering goodnaturedly, Allison and Vanya chatting. 

Luther frowned at the clue to his puzzle. He could use his pencil to do the math or get a calculator, but Five was at the table, “What’s 48 times 357?”

But Five didn’t answer. “17,136,” Klaus mumbled into his arms.

The table froze and a few glanced at Klaus, a few glanced at Five, who silently nodded. Luther hadn’t even been sure Klaus was still awake. 

Clearing his throat, Diego said, “What’s 547 times 879?”

“480, 814,” Klaus said after a moment’s hesitation. 

Five nodded again. “What’s 9 minus 3 divided by 1/3 and plus 1?”

Klaus lifted his head slightly, eyebrows scrunched up, “Plus 1?”

“Yeah.”

“It’s 1. What’s with the math? I was told there was breakfast food, not, y’know, simple math.” Klaus looked very confused and very tired. “I’m trying to stay awake. _Math will put me to sleep._ So boring.” He gave a large yawn and put his head back on his arms. He mumbled something about being sleepy.

The rest of them looked back and forth, mouthing ‘did you know?’ ‘no!’ ‘since when?’ ‘did ben tell him?’ ‘seemed like klaus knew it’ ‘what the fuck?’

Klaus was snoring as Grace put waffles down in front of him.


	2. drop that, its poison

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thank god for google. hey y'all its hard to write about smart klaus when you aren't smart yourself

Did Diego really have to choose the week that Allison was visiting to take their mother out of town to see some of the sites in her paintings?

How the house got to be such a mess with four people and a ghost in the short amount of time was beyond her. So they wrote down what all needed cleaned and drew from a bowl to see who would clean what.

She got the kitchen. It wasn’t too bad. She’d have to go through the food to see what was bad, make sure all the appliances were deep cleaned, make sure the bottom of the table was free of gum stuck to it. The problem was as she was doing the dishes that had been left around the house (a number of glasses were scattered in various rooms, a few plates with crumbs) the sink had gotten clogged. Possibly with food? Or grease? 

Allison wasn’t used to cleaning like this. 

But she had Drano, Clorox Bleach, and Pure Ammonia. That should cut through whatever was in the pipe for sure. 

After she’d put the bleach in the sink but before she’d added anything else, Klaus wondered in. Smiling, he went to grab a freshly clean glass and then he saw the ammonia in her hands. He frowned, “For the love of all that is holy, and the love of yourself, please tell me you’re going to clean the bleach out first.”

“No? If I mix--”

“You could die,” he pointed at her. “I’m serious, Allison. Bleach and ammonia creates a toxic and possibly explosive liquid hydrazine. People have died from it. I would know!” He giggled and then winked at the air.

“A what?”

“Its a bad poison. Oh god, is that Drano?” He actually reached out and took the ammonia from her hands gingerly. “Stop, just-- _no_. Darling, I love you and care about you. Please don’t mix this.” He eyed the bleach, “And don’t add vinegar either. Chloramine vapors, you know how it is.”

“Is it really that serious?”

“Uh, yeah? The chemical compounds can be very hazardous. Also, by the smell of it, you put a ton of bleach in the sink. And, like, just don’t add bleach to anything please, _god_. I don’t want you to accidentally chloroform yourself. What a fucking mess that would be, huh?”

“Bleach isn’t part of chloroform,” Allison rolled her eyes.

Klaus grabbed her gently and sat her down, “Uh, yeah? Rubbing alcohol and bleach? Please just, okay. Don’t mix chemicals. Let a professional like me mix them, okay?”

“You’ve just mixed drug chemicals, Klaus. Knowing about those drugs doesn’t mean you know about cleaning chemicals.”

“_Honey_, its basic chemistry. The reactions that come from mixing all of these are to be expected and they’re known about. M’kay?” Klaus started scrubbing at the sink. “God two days ago I had to stop Luther from mixing peroxide and vinegar. Do I need to make a Powerpoint of basic chemicals you can’t mix?”

“Thanks, but I don’t think we need a Powerpoint,” She smiled at him.

“Flashcards then. I’ll make flashcards and posters,” Klaus nodded, rinsing out the sink. “Let’s go buy some cardstock!”

He walked away, muttering about chemicals and compounds some isotopes. Allison wasn’t sure was an isotope was, it sounded familiar. Must have been the name of another cleaning chemical. She pulled out her phone and quickly double checked what Klaus had been saying. 

Turned out he was right. She could have seriously harmed herself (killed herself) if she had continued as planned. Thankfully Klaus not only interrupted her but knew more than she did. 

She’d maybe have to offer to paint his nails as a thank you.


	3. german gala gallery

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i really like how this chapter turned out tbh

She’d wanted to take anyone but Klaus, however Klaus was the only one free. It wasn’t that she didn’t love her sibling. Of course not, she loved him deeply. And it wasn’t that she felt he wasn’t smart enough, the previous weeks showed that he wasn’t dumb by any means. But secretly intelligent about math and chemistry \wasn’t the same as knowing about _culture_.

As far as Allison could remember from childhood, he didn’t pay attention when Pogo was teaching, often too high. But he obviously did have an eye for art, more so than Luther did so hopefully the night wouldn’t end in disaster. 

She’d been invited to a gallery by a german artist for a gala. 

Almost sounded fake, but it wasn’t. She’d met Augusten a few years ago and enjoyed him and his art. She was more than happy to go to his gala. But she couldn’t show up alone. So she’d asked all her siblings. Everyone said they were sorry but no. Everyone but Klaus. 

Allison had her hands full before they even left the house. She had to make sure he looked presentable. He hadn’t cut his hair in a while so it was long ringlets that was a halo around his head and needed product to help keep it in line, she had to make sure he wasn’t wearing that god awful shirt that he claimed was his _nicest outfit_. She hadn’t been seen in public as much since they saved the world and she couldn’t be seen as weak or lesser, even if it was her plus one who was more weak or lesser. 

Klaus hadn’t put up any fight when she gave him a makeover.

So they went to the gala looking appropriate. Klaus looked almost as good as her. She just hoped he wouldn’t be tempted by the free alcohol and would stay on task. 

“Thank you for this,” he whispered in her ear, after taking a large bite of cheese. “I do not get out often enough. Not my usual fanfare but eh, beggars can’t be choosers.”

She smiled at him, “I hope you’re having fun. Not too boring is it?”

He grinned cheekily, “I may tend to enjoy the simple things in life but one can always appreciate some high brow art, my dear. We did have the same _Sir Reginald Hargreeves_ approved upper class bourgeois education after all.”

She was certain that he hadn’t read anything on their reading list unless it was by Oscar Wilde. 

God she hoped he wouldn’t compare any of Augusten’s paintings to Bob Ross or Banksy. 

“It looks like he was inspired by Caspar David Frierich? The use of his color and the layouts are very similar,” Klaus muttered, popping more cheese into his mouth. 

She wasn’t sure who he was talking about, even if this was a real person or if he just threw names together but at least it sounded more upstanding than what she thought he’d say. 

“Good eye,” Augusten came up, smiling at them. “This set was inspired by his work. Allison, lovely to see you.”

“Augusten, this is my brother Klaus. Klaus, this is the artist Auguten Behlen.”

“Spent some time in Bielefeld, did you?” Klaus winked. “Don’t think I didn’t miss the Kunsthalle painting. Genius idea, by the way. Paint a fine arts museum. The irony. Stay classy, Augusten.”

“You’ve been?”

“When we were small children we went on a field trip there once while we were visiting Germany. We were there doing something for the Academy and our father thought it was an ideal time to introduce us to some art.” Klaus paused before adding, “Well different art than what the old man had in his private collection.”

Allison thought back. She did remember a trip to Germany. More than one. The second time? They were there Reggie had taken them to a boring museum. They’d been staying in the town, doing a press tour for the Academy? Reggie deciding to do some shady deals while they were in town? She couldn’t remember.

“I must say, that was a fun time,” Klaus said thoughtfully. “That night I snuck out to meet a guy and we ended up breaking into the Botanischer Garten. Which was less illeciate making out and more botany than planned.” He was pouting.

“Oh, did he bore you plant facts?” Allison teased.

“Nah, he kept asking me for the plant facts. Like he couldn’t just come the next day and ask the staff. No, he had to cut our fun time short for me to tell him all about the plants. Maybe it is a good thing nothing more came of our relationship, such a nerd.”

Augusten laughed, “How is he the nerd when you knew the facts? Off the top of your head, I’ll remind you.”

Klaus shrugged, “Not my fault I have eidetic memory.”

“Such a burden,” Augusten said. Someone across the room caught his eye, “It has been lovely meeting you, Klaus. And great seeing you, Allison. Hopefully we’ll have more time to talk later.”

After he left, Allison saw Klaus stuff four cheese in his mouth at once, giving the air beside him a _told - you - I - could_ look. “Since when do you have eidetic memory?”

“Since always?” Klaus said with his mouth full. After swallowing he added, “That’s how it works, y’know. However the decades of drug abuse has culled it somewhat, thank god. I really don’t want to remember much of our childhood. Can you imagine if I hadn’t done drugs? That brain egg frying pan commercial shall never be forgotten. Ha! I would give Five a run for his money otherwise.” He pointed the the air he’d looked at earlier, “Yeah, good point Ben. I’d also have to care about this upper class bullshit too. I’d rather have fun.” He made his point by grabbing a whole tray of cheese from a server. 

The rest of the night had Allison quietly surprised as Klaus not only spoke of classic art, but books and music with the guests, often even throwing out details about the artists that not many new. He could have been making the fact up but she liked to think she knew when he lied and he wasn’t. He just _knew_ this stuff.

“Not all of this was covered in our classes,” she hinted at asking.

He shrugged, “Libraries are warm and free. I spent a lot of winters there while I was a-roaming lad. Read a lot. When I could focus passed the drug haze, that was. If I couldn’t focus, Ben would read to me. It was soothing. You ever been blitzed out of your gourd and your best ghost reads to you from _The Book of Disquiet_? It is the trippiest shit.”

“That sounds nice? _The Book of Disquiet_?” It didn’t sound nice.

Klaus cleared his throat, “Yeah, it was a book pieced together after the author’s death, of like his thoughts on the world? And life. Such hits as _’Who will save me from existence? It isn’t death I want, or life, it’s the other thing.’_ and oh! I really felt the line _’All I ever asked of life was that it should pass me by without even my noticing it.’_ Like fuck me up and fuck me over.”

She watched as he then started a conversation with another couple of people about classic art. Allison felt like she couldn’t join in at the time because she was busy dealing with the fact that Klaus so far had casually mentioned having eidetic memory, spent a lot of time in libraries while he was homeless (and if that didn’t break her heart, she was now planning on giving to some charities for libraries, if there such things), and saying those _disquiet_ lines really resonated with him. 

She should stop underestimating Klaus. 

“Shut up, Ben. Just because I’m lactose intolerant doesn’t mean I can’t enjoy cheese,” Klaus muttered, shoving more cheese in his mouth.


	4. families that game together die together

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> sorry for the delay, please forgive

It was Allison’s idea. Family game night. Once a week they would get together and play board games because that’s what families did. No one knew enough about families to protest the fact, so instead they went to the store and bought one of each game. Klaus even made sure they bought the children games, saying he’d love to build some cooties or spent some time not waking daddy.

First night they played scrabble.

Diego was first and smirked when he played ‘za’. Scoring a lot of points for a small two letter word. He was put on guard when Klaus laughed and thanked him.

“I was missing the ‘z’,” he informed cheerily as he laid some tiles down. “Muzjiks.”

“That’s not a word,” Diego declared. “You’re just throwing letters down and using my ‘z’!”

_”You’re a muzjik,”_ Klaus muttered. “Zoya’s been teaching me Russian. It’s a peasant. She’s so mean, she called me a peasant when I made pie the other day. She was very displeased with my pie crust. Very loud and judgemental sighs as I did everything.”

“I thought your pie crust was good,” Vanya commented.

“Well yeah, she made me throw out my old crust and start over!”

“Are you allowed to use other languages?” Luther asked.

“Rule book says it's okay,” Allison said with a shrug. 

They continued. A few more small words, Five layed out a word to rival Klaus’s, locking eyes with him as he did so.

_“Oh it is on.”_

Chutzpah 

Gherkins

Quartzy

Syzygy (“That’s not a word, Five!” Diego yelled. Klaus laughed, “It’s an alignment of three celestrial bodies!”)

Oxazepam (“Before you ask, it’s a well known drug. As if I’d play this without naming _at least_ one drug.”)

“Okay!” Diego yelled after Five played ‘jousting’. “This isn’t fun anymore. It’s just a Klaus vs Five game now. This is bullshit.” He pointed at Allison, “Scrap scrabble.”

The next game night was Cranium. It was a strange game that was a mix of trivia, performing, and artistic ability.

Allison was best at the performing, Klaus was the best at artistic ability and then--

When there was a question about which planet had most of their moons named after Shakespeare characters it wasn’t Luther who knew, but Klaus. He giggled as he answered, “Uranus.”

And next--

He knew that a group of zebra’s is a “dazzle”, China was the first country that used printed paper currency, and Sinhala and Tamil were official language of Sri Lanka.

“Is Ben helping you?” Luther questioned.

“No? I just, I don’t know, retain useless information? _As if_ I need to know that Ecuador, Colombia, and Brazil are the three South American countries that the equator passes through,” Klaus rolled his eyes. “Blah! Who cares?! Nothing new though, am I right? Useless powers, useless information.”

He didn’t let them tell him he wasn’t useless, he waved them off and pulled the next _humdinger_ card.

The third game night Five declared they would play Risk. 

Vanya was the first to leave the table. Allison next. Luther followed much later. Diego tried to last, being very competitive, but eventually he left the game. Five glared Klaus down, taking the game more serious than Klaus was. 

How Klaus was _beating Five_ when he wasn’t even _trying_. 

Two moves after Diego left, Five flipped the board, sending pieces flying. 

Klaus turned to Ben as Five teleported away, “Wonder what’s up with him?”

“Next week you should suggest a game of chance. Like Candyland or Uno,” Ben gave Klaus a smile.

“Sure! Lord Licorice is a literal snack.”


	5. that code was supposed to be uncrackable? how? its harder to crack an egg, okay? at least then he’s worried about getting shell in his egg. this? this was easy-peasy.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i really kind of love this one

Klaus was _tired_ but he was also _very much awake_.

Insomnia was a slut. Got around to visit everyone and always stayed the night.

Been staying with Klaus for a few days now. He wished he could kick her out like he’d always been kicked out.

Instead he found himself in Reggie’s old study, going through some papers. Surely reading some of his notes would put him to sleep.

He did find a note that looked old. Not in Reggie’s handwriting. And it seemed to be a code of some sort. Klaus saw the post-it on the front that had been written by Reggie. 

_”Secret code. Received in mail on Sept. 16. Number Five is gone and can’t crack it. Asked Number Four, most likely candidate after Number Five. Number Four only looked at it and said, ‘All the letters have eyebrows. They are arched.’ Too high to be of use. The note has been deemed unimportant, but all members of the Academy are disappointments for not solving the code.”_

Klaus snorted, “Well you couldn’t solve it either, pops.”

Klaus tried to remember when Reggie handed it to him earlier. He had a vague memory of Reggie giving him a paper that made no sense and he’d told him, “I accept your resignation.” Mind, that could have been some other paper. He didn’t remember saying the eyebrows over the letters were arched but he must have. 

During that time he’d been taking a lot of Special K. 

Shrugging to himself, he got to work.

He hoped it was an easy cypher and that he wouldn’t need to find the code book. A simple cypher. Please. He was _tired_. He wouldn’t be able to figure out something hard.

First he checked a few of the more common codes and cyphers. Thankfully it seemed like a substitution cypher.

He drew up a few possibilities on some spare paper. Hopefully a spare one? It didn’t seem important and he wrote on the backs of them so Luther and the others could still read whatever boring stuff Reggie had to say. 

Reggie’s notes were _boring_ and _unimportant_. This code? Fun! Exciting! Klaus was a spy now!

As he worked on it, he found himself humming the Mission Impossible theme. Or he thought it was the theme? Wasn’t Allison in the latest one of those? He’d have to ask her.

He zoned out.

But he thought he got it. His hand was cramping by the time he cracked it, but what he translated made sense. (But did it really? He was _tired_.)

It was a note describing how this stranger was going to kidnap the Umbrella Academy. He would create a trap and kidnap them all. He had a plan for stopping all of them. 

Klaus found himself worried. 

He’d been kidnapped once already! He didn’t want to go through that again!

Taking his papers he ran to Luther’s room. He was Number One. He’d know what to do!

“Luther! Lu!” Klaus let himself in, leaving the door open so the light spilled into the dark room.

Luther sat up suddenly, “Klaus?”

“Luther! We’ve got to be careful!” Klaus waved the papers around.

“What is it?” Luther reached for the papers. He gently took them and frowned at them. Then he looked at Klaus, “Hey, sit down.” He gently took Klaud and made him sit on his bed.

“I cracked the code, Lu. He’s planning on a kidnapping!” Klaus said, pressing his hands on Luther’s chest. “Please don’t let me be kidnapped again.”

“Klaus, this is dated 17 years ago,” Luther took Klaus’s hands in his own. “You look tired.”

“17 years he’s been planning this?” Klaus gasped. _“He’ll have planned for everything.”_

“No, Klaus,” Luther spoke gently. “The guy who wrote this? I think I remember that day. His set up. We took him down in about five minutes.”

“What? No? I just solved his code tonight,” Klaus protested.

Luther smiled softly at him, “Couldn't sleep, huh?”

“No. Insomnia, _the slut._”

Luther chuckled, “Okay, Klaus.” He pulled him closer and laid him down on the bed, laying down next to him, “You did good. How about you get some sleep. I’ll be look out this time, okay?”

“Promise?” Klaus asked quietly.

“Promise,” Luther put an arm over Klaus, making him snuggle up. It made Klaus feel safe and warm. 

Luther waited silently until Klaus finally let himself fall asleep. Keeping an arm around Klaus, he looked over the papers and was impressed. He remembered this letter. Their father had been upset that no one could figure out the code. 

No one had come close to figuring it out. He saw their father’s note, making comments about how the two who would be able to solve it had run away or was high. Reginald had made it horrible for them for a few weeks, making Pogo go over codes and cyphers and yet no one had been able to figure it out. 

Somehow Klaus had been able to figure it out while so sleep deprived he had been certain that he was in danger.

Luther set the papers aside and laid down next to Klaus. He’d have to tell the others Klaus figured out the code in the morning. Make sure they knew about his hard work. They had all learned recently that Klaus was actually very smart. 

It was humbling, learning such new things about their brother.

Luther was proud.

They all were.

(Luther wondered if he’d get any sleep with Klaus’s cold hands and feet wrapping themselves around him, and his mutterings about code-breaking in his ear.)

**Author's Note:**

> obliqueoptimism @ tumblr


End file.
